Hello blog-followers, Lindy here

Hi everyone, here I am, Lindy Davies-Schear, wearing my best smile, to tell you my mom has been having trouble with the relationship between her camera and her computer, and with someone named Blogger. It's too bad, because they used to get along so well, but now the computer is rejecting the camera, while Blogger is rejecting the computer, and they're all breaking my mom's heart.

Plus, Mom says that, as far as poetry is concerned, her muse has abandoned her. I'm not sure what a muse is. I know what a camera is, and know what sound it makes when my mom turns it on, and I know where the computer is, but a muse? I think that should be "amuse" but Mom says no, and I understand what "no" means. It means the same as "Lindy, leave it!"

Wishing all our Canadian friends Happy Canada Day on July 1, and all our American friends Happy Fourth of July, and all our other friends Happy Day!
 — Lindy, Kay and Richard

Photo by Richard Schear

How much is that doggy reflection?

Lindy seems to be staring at her own reflection in the refrigerator, but she's not. Her close-up vision is pretty much nonexistent now, although she can still see objects farther away (yesterday, when walking with Dick while I checked on something, she headed for the wrong red car, and it wasn't even parked near ours).
So, instead of contemplating her lovely self, she is dreaming (as usual) about the contents of the refrigerator. You never can tell when someone is going to take out one of those lovely big cucumbers she so adores.

Posted for Weekend Reflections
hosted by James of  Something Sighted

Thanks, James!

Also posted for Pet Pride, hosted by Lindy's friend Bozo and his family at their Pets Forever blog in Mumbai, India.

Photo by Richard Schear with his smart phone

Galapagotian rhymes for Open Link Monday

I have no idea if that is a word...Galapagotian...my computer seems to think it isn't, but it suits me. Our present busy travel schedule all started with a trip to the Galapagos Islands in 2006 and we have been traveling ever since. Round and 'round the world we go, where we'll stop, nobody knows.

Sigh.

A few lines of this came to me the evening of Friday, the 13th of June, and other lines kept coming, so I am saving it all for Open Link Monday at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads. I'm hoping I can be back to contributing regularly soon.

I don't believe I have any toad photos from the Galapagos Islands, but I have plenty of other fun creatures.

one foot, two foot

red foot, blue foot

and another one

on the way

marine iguana

land iguana

hadn’t much to say

and nazca booby

turned his head away

sea urchins large

and sea urchins small

they neither lurch nor sway

and penguins

and sea lions

                                                      I love them both

this lonely fellow                       

                                           perhaps the most

hello can your husband come out to play?

no we can look but we cannot stay

moonscape with frigate bird

ship’s mast with more

and then on the shore

birds and animals galore

  lava lizards  

   flamingos

flightless cormorants and more

  

     and we mustn’t forget

     Darwin’s delight

     a finch upside down

     and one upside right

     about which science

     for long years would fight

and last but not least

no not least at all

the galapagos tortoise

the oldest of all

Photos by

Richard Schear

and Kay L. Davies

W.B. Yates in the Imaginary Garden

For her form challenge this weekend, Kerry has presented to The Imaginary Garden with Real Toads the octaves of William Butler Yeats — a poet who, as Kerry says, needs no introduction.

Considered one of the foremost poets of the 20th Century, his influences were traditional Irish ballads and songs. Writing extensively in rhymed verse, Yates used quatrains in his earlier poems but, later, he preferred the octave as a stanza form.

foxhunter, from Wikipedia

Having returned to writing after something of a drought caused by illness, fear and exhaustion, I am not quite up to par, in my own estimation. I should have been excited to see the word ballad and, indeed, I was pleased, but nothing sprang to mind yesterday.

Earlier today, I couldn't quite come up with 8 lines of 8 syllables, and produced only this bit of nonsense, alternating 6 syllables with the requisite 8, arriving at a Kiplingesque rhythm rather than a proper Keatsian iambic pentameter.
the fox was out with many men

to take them for a ride

he knew they’d follow where he went

and knew where he could hide

outfoxed they were, those many men

who’d come from far and wide

Texas "Haunted" house built by
Dan Baker and friends

when brother fox, he ran them out

across the countryside

Later, although I couldn't avoid considerable maudlin sentimentality, and definitely couldn't call up my usual humorous muse, I did manage an entire two stanzas, then decided to post them in order to give up the struggle for today.

the house where lives my broken heart

is haunted by the loss of you

I promised always to be true

and now don’t know how I can start

a life without you in this place

where ev’ry wall and ev’ry door

where ev’ry board in ev’ry floor

seems each imprinted with your face

my heart has longed for you too long

my soul aloud for you has cried

but to the outside world I’ve lied

and did my best to be so strong

to hold my head up, even smile

say “I am fine now, thank you, please,

“don’t worry now, just be at ease”

to fool them all out there a while

Kay Davies, June, 2014                   

Shadow Shot Sunday 2, with Lindy, too

Photos by Richard Schear, June, 2014

Lindy pauses to pant and puff in the shadows for a while during a walk this week with her daddy.
Now that her eyesight is compromised by cataracts, she wears her harness and we clip her leash to that, rather than to her collar, giving us better control. She still wears her collar, because her tags are on it, but she quickly learned that the harness means she is going out with us.

Posted for
Shadow Shot Sunday 2
and also for Pet Pride
hosted by Lindy's friend Bozo and his family at their Pets Forever blog in Mumbai, India.

Italian painter featured in the Garden

Today, over in the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, our friend Fireblossom features Italian painter Guido Vedovato. Because copyright prevents us showing his paintings per se, I have chosen to use the two photos of the artist, with his work behind him.
More of his paintings can be seen on his website. His work is in the field of art called "naive" and therefore I have kept my style simple, as both complement and compliment.

Guido Vedovato Wikipedia (Creative Commons)

Guido’s rockinghorse can till the fields

while the village sleeps behind him

and the hills rise up

out of the forest

his birds have wings no larger than their feet

but the town on the tree below them

tempts them to land

atop the tower

the concertina-player 'neath the moon

plays lullabies to help his people dream

By Kay L. Davies, June 14, 2014

Can't resist kitten pictures

Though the world knows I'm a dog person, I can't resist seeing photos of kittens. They are just too darn cute.

Judy, at Through Squirrel Eyes, posted pictures of her foster-kittens, Alice, Cooper, and Vincent (yes, Alice and Cooper) for See Beautiful today, and I simply had to look up photos of my brother and sister-in-law's cat, Bailey, when he was a kitten.

I love this shot of him on his climbing-tree when he was little, compared with the one of him on the same tree when he was grown. The two pictures together always make me laugh, and laughter is good medicine, I've been told.

Besides, Judy asked: "For the month of June on See Beautiful we have a question. What can be more beautiful than the innocence of little ones, be they kittens, puppies or human?"

Bailey Davies, above, looking innocently beautiful, and below, still looking beautiful but much wiser.

This is a blog hop. I've never done this before, but I'm going to try to link.

Reflections in Danube never grow old

This spring we visited Budapest for the second time, and my husband was delighted to find new angles from which to photograph old favourites...the buildings and bridges along the Danube. We were also fortunate to stay in a hotel room with river views. Beautiful, day and night, but especially night.

Posted for Weekend Reflections
hosted by James of Something Sighted
Thanks, James!

Photos by Richard Schear, 2014

Ever-changing skies for Hungarian show

While we were in Hungary during our recent Danube cruise, my intrepid photographer visited a farm where modern riders recreate scenes of ancient Hungarian farms...from oxcarts to what he calls "cowboy stuff" under blue and changing skies.

Posted for Skywatch Friday

Photos by Richard Schear, 2014

Stealing an idea from a friend's sidebar

Writing this will just take me a moment, and I'm glad, because it's late, and I'm not up to writing much yet. But do take a look at the writing prompt below. It might be fun for you. I couldn't manage an acrostic myself right now, that's for sure.
Thanks, Jo in Africa, for the idea, which you probably didn't know I'd lifted from your blog's sidebar.
Note to Toads and other grammarians: I know it should be "a person whom" rather than "a person that" but I didn't write it. Honestly, I stole it. I did.

Writing Prompts:

• Pick a random person that you know and use their name for an acrostic. 

Lindy when she first came to our house

Oh my goodness, Lindy, what are you doing?!

I'm helping you dig a garden.




See?

It's very hard work, you know. I think I need a rest.

Photos by Kay L. Davies

Oh, yes, I'll rest here. This is much nicer. But I did dig you a very nice hole. Maybe you can plant a tree, or a bush, perhaps.

Posted for Pet Pride, hosted by Lindy's friend Bozo and his family at their Pets Forever blog in Mumbai, India. Check it out, and meet some of Lindy's other friends.

Lindy says, "Hi, Bozo, I don't remember this. I don't dig holes any more. My mom didn't plant a tree in my lovely hole, so I quit. But I guess the yard has enough trees in it for one dog, especially as I only want trees to look at, and to sleep under when the weather is hot. I know it is very hot where you live. I hope you have a favourite tree."

Stress, less, and mess

Am still adjusting to being a real finger-pricking diabetic instead of just a borderline diabetic with wonky blood sugar. It's been a series of ups and downs, and between illness and household renovations, I haven't been very active on my blog or even on Facebook.

Wish I could say I'm alive and well. However, I can say I'm alive and hopeful.

This photo was 11 years ago, but I like it better than this year's pictures. It was taken in the Dominican Republic, which has produced many big league baseball players for us to enjoy.

These days we're talking about going to Seattle to see our currently-league-leading Toronto Bluejays play in August. I can't make the commitment yet, but I'd love to be feeling up to exclaiming "Yay! Play ball!"

My intrepid photographer, Richard Schear, at left. The former me, at right.

This may be incoherent and emotional

This night, June 4, 2014, three members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were killed and two are hospitalized with injuries in Moncton, New Brunswick.
I am asking everyone to send love and understanding to the families of the fallen and of the wounded, and to their fellow officers who are working so hard to find the perpetrator.
They know his name, and what he looks like, but not much else, yet. By morning they may know much more.
Please also send love and understanding to the family of the 24-year-old who chose to dress himself up in camouflage fatigues, take two large weapons, and go out to shoot police officers.

Fox News photo

If, as could be the case, he has no family to love and understand him, perhaps we could find it in our hearts to forget his crimes for a moment, so that we might wonder what made him who he is today, a young man who kills policemen.

FB's word list in the garden

At the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, my friend Fireblossom has given us a word list challenge. One of the words on the list is "garden" and I have been thinking about that very subject today.
All the words in boldface are from Fireblossom's list, but not all the words from her list are in my poem.

I would love

from http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/

a kitchen garden—

salad from a package

of seeds,

but the riddle

for succeeding

drove me crazy.

now I want to

choose the seeds

of my favourite things

to plant where animals

cannot reach them—

the simplicity of

this system stunned me

Kay L. Davies, June, 2014                                                  

Thanks to gardenweb.com for the photo and the idea. I have a vegetable-loving dog who can sniff out free veggies from two blocks away, and I have a bad back, so I have a hard time bending down to tend a garden. This solution seems to address both problems. My old patio table is probably still sturdy enough to hold a couple of bags of potting soil, but I don't think I'll be growing any squashes any time soon. Baby carrots, however...yum!

Dreaming of treats in the sunshine

This photo is posted for Pet Pride, which is hosted by Lindy's friend Bozo and his family at their Pets Forever blog in Mumbai, India.

Bozo mentioned treats this time. Lindy is probably dreaming of treats here, Bozo. Since the weather has warmed up in southeastern Alberta, Canada, she is spending more and more time outside. She loves the sun, but when it gets too hot, she enjoys nice cold floors! (This is the floor of the deck.)
Soon we'll have to get her swimming pool out so she'll really be able to cool off.

Math, history, geography: 55 words

Over at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, my friend Hedgewitch has insisted that the Flash 55 challenge produce exactly, precisely 55 words, no more, no less: a challenge within a challenge, for me. Last time, I believe I managed 54 words, but I tried to do better this time. Count carefully, Kay, I muttered, et voilá, it's 55 words. Some even rhyme.

Uh-oh, I just noticed Hedge says it is Flash Fiction 55, but mine isn't exactly fictitious. O well, can't win 'em all, and all that.
Sigh.
Next month, Flash 55 will be hosted by one of Hedge's cohorts, either Mama Zen or Fireblossom, whoever comes first.

Mule Deer

when I was fifty-five,

finding myself still alive,

I thought I might strive

for something new.

what did I do?

I left all I knew:

(having packed up everything

that was worth taking)

then made my way

across the Rockies

to the place where the deer

and the antelope play.

(written today,

by Kay)

Pronghorn Antelope

Photos by
Richard Schear